At the present time, it is the current practice in the undertaking field in preparing the remains of deceased persons for funeral services and burial, to clothe only such portions of the remains as will be exposed to view during any viewing of the remains by the family and friends of the deceased. Since only the upper torso, arms and head of the body are normally visible for purpose of viewing, provision is made for clothing only these bodily portions. Thus, male cadavers are typically dressed in a specially constructed "fake" shirt which has a normal appearing front section but at the back is left open or constituted of overlapping or loosely fastened panels for easy application, together with a suit coat or jacket which at the back is either specially constucted in the same way or simply slit open through its full length. In similar fashion, blouses or dresses typically used to dress female cadavers are specially made with an open back construction or slit along their full length. The remainder of the body in either case is merely covered by a casket blanket or quilt formed as a part of the lining of the casket or provided separately by the mortician. While this blanket or quilt shields the lower bodily regions from direct view, it does not constitute an effective covering for such regions.
Rigor mortis reaches completion within a few hours after death and ordinarily long before the mortician can have convenient access to the body for purposes of burial preparation. Consequently, some special modification of clothing used for funeral purposes is unavoidable to permit such clothing to be applied over the rigid bodily members of the deceased. However, unusual circumstances can arise where it would be desirable for the remains to be fully clothed, for instance for sanitary reasons. Moreover, certain particularly sensitive persons, especially when caught up in the emotional strain incidental to the death of a relative or close friend, might well find repugnant the notion of allowing the remains to undergo burial in largely unclothed condition or might for esthetic reasons prefer in any case the body to be essentially fully clothed in an undergarment underlying the usual exterior burial garments.
The object of the invention is therefore to provide a unitary or one-piece burial undergarment which is designed and constructed to envelop essentially the entire body, exclusive of the head, of the deceased but is nonetheless capable of being donned without undue difficulty onto a fully rigid corpse.
This and other objects and advantages will be made apparent by the following detailed description when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.